had a really unexciting weekend since the weather was so BLEGH. this is probably the time of year I hate---when the rest of the country is warming up and enjoying "spring" and seattle still feels like winter, if not worse, and it rains every freakin' day. i'm completely unmotivated to do anything but sit inside and clean/organize my apartment...and watch movies. if anything, i did a lot of cooking, making a really yummy mushroom risotto on sunday evening...how satisfying to make a good dinner.

there've been a lot of articles in the media recently about the dilemna that highly successful, ambitious women deal with in weighing out having a family vs. a career (such as in this Time magazine article) A lot of the daughters of the feminist movement who've focused on establishing their careers are finding themselves unable to have children at an older age as women's bodies have not changed...and technology hasn't done anything to change that. A woman's ability to conceive begins to decline at the age of 27. By the age of 42, 90% of a woman's eggs are abnormal. A recent national study found that the more money a woman made, the less likely it was that she had children (on the contrary, the higher a man's salary, the more likely it was that he had children). there is currently a lot of controversy over marketing these facts (for example, a picture of a baby bottle shaped like an hourglass) so that women can become better informed (the president of N.O.W. sees this marketing as pressuring younger women who aren't ready to have a child, to do so). So many of my ambitious Smith co-graduates fall under this dilemna: wanting to be successful and wanting to have a family, including myself. The corporate lifestyle isn't tailored to allow for successful executives to be good parents also. I know I want to have a family eventually but there are so many aspects of my career that I want to explore also. My former manager set up a "breakfast club" for women at the company to meet once a month and I'm looking forward to hearing opinions regarding this topic (she sent out an article similar to the Time magazine one to the group recently) later this week.

thomas and I are taking Salsa 2b currently at Century Ballroom, and at last night's class, the instructor--Hallie--pulled me aside to dance with me. I was pretty nervous as I didn't know if I was just doing something competely wrong..but after we danced, she just said to me "perfect". At end of class, she came up to me and told me that for the next session of classes, I should move onto Salsa 3---which is SO exciting! Talk about a nice pat on the back!

did i mention i've been obsessed with watching abc's most recent reality show, the bachelor? it's actually not as sleazy as "Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire" or Tempation Island...this bachelor, Alex, started off with 25 women..and in 6 weeks, he will propose to 1, slowly eliminating a number of women with each episode. Anyhow, last night's episode brought him down to 3 women--oh, the excitement! i have to admit that I just LOVE reality tv shows...it's my guilty pleasure.